"11. Four Chinese players"

They finally got around to satisfying IMG's deal points to announcing the WGC-HSBC event in China and the field qualifications offer what I think may be a couple of buried ledes:

3. Winners from 23 PGA TOUR cosponsored events in 2009, which shall be identified as those 23 PGA TOUR events from 2008 with the highest Official World Golf Ranking Strength of Field Rating, having a rating of 40 points or more.

Bear with me. First this:

11. Four Chinese players

And? Nothing else? Just "Four Chinese Players" as a category?

So stringent!

Alright here's what I found interesting:

13. If necessary to fill the field to 78 players, additional Tournament Winners from the 2008 HSBC Champions through the event preceding the 2009 WGC-HSBC Champions, which shall be identified as those winners of events from the 2007 HSBC Champions to the 2008 HSBC Champions with the highest Official World Golf Ranking Strength of Field Rating, having a rating of 40 points or more, not listed in an above category:

2008/2009 Events    Winner
Bob Hope Chrysler Classic     Perez, Pat
Buick Open
Justin Timberlake Classic
John Deere Classic
Wyndham Championship
RBC Canadian Open
Fry's.com Open
Valero Texas Open
Turning Stone Resort Champ.
Casio World Open           Oda, Koumei
Viking Classic
BMW Italian Open
Madrid Masters
Estoril Open de Portugal           Hoey, Michael
Mitsubishi Diamond
US Bank Championship
Munsingwwear Open
Japan Tour Championship

World Ranking gurus out there, I'm wondering if this is the first time that the line has been so publicly drawn with event winners needing to come from events "having a rating of 40 points or more?"

If so, seems it could set an interesting precedent for other world events or majors?

Comments

[PD]

It's not the first time a minimum of OWGR Ranking points are neccessary. It's also been so earlier in some WGC tournaments. Though I can't remember which and as I'm travelling I don't have the time to find out which tournaments but I'm quite sure...

[Ian C]

PD -From the top of my head - not the Doral one but the other one that isn't match play. The US PGA warm-up event.

[Ronald Montesano]

I thought that four chinese players was a new entry on the Twelve Days of Christmas.

[Geoff]

PD,
I wasn't very clear. What I meant was, is this the first time this has been the case with PGA Tour events?

[O.B.]

According to this, it's not the first time:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WGC-Bridgestone_Invitational

Tournament winners of worldwide events since the prior year's tournament with an Official World Golf Ranking Strength of Field Rating of 100 points or more.


But you are correct Geoff that it appears to be specifically applying to PGA Tour events, or maybe it's just bad wording on the Wiki post. I see what you are getting at though. It's isolating more dramatically which tour fields are weak.

[M]

The 40 owgr points is confusing, is it 40 for the winner or 40 event points? Kellys wins last week was worth 38 for himself but the event points was way over 40. Jaidees win last week was only worth 32 individual points, yet both are listed as being auto-qualified.

Will CA and Bridgestone now get "4 American" spots as well? might as well just call them sponsor picks.

Meh, bet half the qualified field wont even show up anyways.